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World Series: A Fan’s Decision to Hold onto His Bud Lights

Anthony Cerciello

Sports, Event, and Tourism Department, Montclair State University

MKTG 320: Sports Marketing and Management

Dr. Josh Lupinek

December 19, 2019

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For my Marketing Project I chose to talk about the World Series. The NY Jets experience

sounded and looked fun, but once I heard that we can write a paper about the World Series, I was

kind of excited. I was excited for multiple reasons. First being, I didn’t have to go freeze my butt

off at MetLife dealing with drunk people and tickets. Second of all, I was going to be watching

the World Series anyway, might as well make something productive come from it. The

marketing topic/theme that I chose from the textbook to connect with the World Series event are

the Five P’s in the Sports Marketing Mix. The biggest marketing takeaway from this World

Series was Bud Light. My suggestion for future marketers of this event next year is to build more

hype around the stud players. They made an attempt at it this year in the Postseason video where

they showed the old school vs. the new school players and the difference of the game. I think

they should continue to go in that direction because it definitely covered a lot of demographics

between the old greats and the new ones.

Another reason I was so excited about doing the World Series event instead of the NY

Jets experience is because I didn’t have to move much to watch the World Series. Even though I

did tell myself I’d go broke buying a ticket if the Yankees made it. The World Series was a 7

game series this year in which the Washington Nationals defeated the Houston Astros. The series

lasted from October 22 until October 30th. Every single game started at around 8:06 Eastern time.

The games varied from 3 hours and 19 minutes long in game 5 to 4 hours and three minutes in

game 3. The average game time was 3 hours and forty-four minutes. Only two games lasted

longer than four hours. The logistics/transportation/setting of getting to/watching the event was

pretty basic. I watched the game at my house with my parents and also had some buddies over to

watch it one night, so there was no transportation necessary for those games. One night we
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watched it at my buddies so I had go to and from his house with an Uber. The rest of the series

we either watched it at Applebees or a local bar, which either my friend drove or we Ubered.

I did not receive any training, or on-site meetings, but I have a lot of history watching

baseball. My mom and dad had me playing baseball at the age of three. Baseball was my life

until I got older and realized you can hit kids in football. Not everyone can enjoy watching

baseball, if you’re not a baseball fan, there’s no way I expect you to sit through a three to four-

hour game. There’s a lot to appreciate about baseball. Some people love it for the runs being

scored, others love a great pitching matchup where scoring one run might be the deciding factor.

Like I said, I didn’t have any training for this event, but I did do baseball lessons and baseball

training as a kid.

My previous experience on site with an event like this is, I’ve played baseball almost my

whole life, I try to watch every single Yankees game. While trying to complete this assignment,

most of it flowed because baseball means so much to me, but there were some issues I came

across. One of my major issues was trying to relate the World Series to specific lessons we

learned in class. Which is why I focused on the Five P’s because I felt like it was less narrow and

gave me more wiggle room and flexibility on how to relate. Another issue I had was not being

able to write this about the New York Yankees winning. Lastly, another issue that I encountered

was trying to think of how to make marketing more successful for the event next year, but I did

my best.

The marketing topic/theme I chose from Sports Marketing by Bernard Mullin, Stephen

Hardy, and William A. Sutton are the Five P’s in the Marketing Mix. The traditional marketing

mix is only four P’s, but “because sports enjoys so much media attention, we treat public

relations as a separate P” (Mullin, 47). The four other P’s are. Price, Product (development and
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positioning), Place (or product distribution), and Promotion (personal selling, advertising, and

special events). The role of promotion is to inform and persuade the consumer and thus influence

his or her purchasing decision. “The effect of product and price is more truly the effect of price

on product” (Mullin, 433). Price is the most visible and most readily communicable variable of

the marketing mix. Price even influences perception of quality. If you see something that is

similar to itself, and one is priced more than the other, you’d assume the more expensive one is

of higher quality. “Consumers also develop a product image based on their perceptions of the

product’s attributes. Similarly, sports consumers develop perceptions of the place in which an

event occurs, namely, a faculty image” (Mullin, 434). When the New York Stars, a women’s

professional team played their home games in Iona College Gymnasium it hurt the image of the

product. It was hard to convince their fans to come out to support them. They tried to move to

Madison Square Garden but an increased overhead was not a smart move for an underfinanced

team. “Big-league products demand big-league places” (Mullins, 435).

The World Series followed the Five P’s in the Marketing Mix. The World Series was played

on Fox and was also available on YouTube.TV which is an example of Place in the marketing

mix. Bud Light, Taco Bell, and ShagMag used Promotion by taking their shot when they had it.

All three promotions will be explained later in the paper. An example of Price is everything that

you pay in order to attend the World Series. The World Series earns their revenue through “ticket

sales, broadcasting rights and sponsorships. Everything costs something to the consumer…In this

case it is the fee of the ticket that the spectator pays to watch the match at the stadium or the TV

subscription charges that is paid by the consumers” (mbaskool.com).

The reason I chose the Five P’s in the Marketing Mix is mostly because of Public Relations

and Promotion. “In a wireless age, staying connected to consumers is possible 365/24/7…
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Nothing can replace the human touch… Great customer service will always be the major force

moving fans up the escalator.” (Mullin, 47). Customer service is very important. For example,

this doesn’t have to do with the World Series, but it happened in the American League

Championship series. My friend and I had tickets to go to game 2. Game 2 was rained out. There

was a lot of confusion whether there would be a make-up date or which date our ticket would

allow us to go. Customer service emailed everyone within an hour of the game being canceled

saying, “Your ticket is for game two, whichever day the game is played next, you own the game

2 ticket.” Which immediately cleared up all the confusion.

I observed marketing related efforts prior to the World Series, during the World Series, and

after the World Series. Prior to the World Series, Taco Bell raised a promotion “Steal a base,

Steal a taco”, ShagMag, who I have never heard of brought their name up during the 7th inning of

World Series game 5, and after a World Series game, Bud Light took an event that happened

during the game and made a commercial and a hero of it.

Promotion was an enormous part of this year’s World Series. There were so many different

promotions from: Chevrolet, YouTube.TV, Budweiser, Bud Light, Shag Mag and Taco Bell. My

three favorite ones were: Taco Bell, Bud Light, and Shag Mag. Taco Bell has been doing this

promotion for the last couple of years and if you haven’t heard about it, I’m sorry you didn’t get

a free taco. Before the World Series, Taco Bell offers promotion where at any time during a

World Series game, if a player successfully steals a base, they will reward customers with one

free Loco Taco. In the first game, a Nationals’ player successfully stole second. Taco Bell

handed out free tacos on October 30th. This related to the course theory because of Taco Bell’s

promotion made people who love tacos and know nothing about the World Series, watch
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baseball to see someone steal a base. As well as offering that promotion, the promotion is

physically displayed behind home plate for some innings.

My favorite promotion wasn’t caught by many, on real time, but it was definitely trending on

Twitter and might have been talked about more than the game itself that night. It was in the 7th

inning in game 5. Julia Rose is an Instagram model and founder of ShagMag. Julia and two other

women from the company were seated right behind home plate and flashed the camera. The

women’s’ chests were captured by viewers on live TV. All three women were immediately

removed from the stadium and were given a lifelong ban from the MLB. “Their motivation for

the stunt seems to be promoting ShagMag, as the trio wore T-shirts emblazoned with the

magazine’s logo. In a video Kayla Lauren posted on Twitter right after they flashed the camera,

the women say “donate to breast cancer” and “save the boobies”” (heavy.com). This promotion

related to the course theory because it took a huge platform like the World Series, and these

women drew attention to their company by getting their names in the headlines and their

company shown on TV too. I knew who the model was, but had no idea about the company until

I read into the story.

Finally, my next favorite one was pure genius by Bud Light. During one of the games there

was a home run ball hit. The ball was hit to a man holding two Bud Light cans. The man didn’t

think for a second to drop his beers as he let the home run ball smack him in the chest. After the

World Series game, Bud Light tweeted out the video of what happened and said, “This man is a

hero. Twitter please figure out who this guys is so we can reward him. #WorldSeries.” Bud Light

tracked him down and gave him tickets to the next game. Bud Light quickly made a T-shirt for

the man that said “Always Save the Beers.” Then he was in Bud Lights commercial where they

say, “Pain is temporary, glory is forever.” Bud Light has also hinted at giving this man free Bud
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Light for life. I thought this related perfectly to the course theory because it’s a company seizing

the opportunity of a man not attempting to catch a World Series ball into a commercial. On top

of that because of their service, I’m sure he’ll tell all his friends and family about the experience.

Some of my unsuccessful experiences during the World Series are solely due to a Fan Duel

promotion. This promotion was available at the beginning of the Wild Card round. I am a huge

Yankees fan and was really confident that they would be winning or at least in the World Series.

The bet was that either the Yankees, Astros, or Dodgers win the World Series. The confident

man that I thought I was, thought, “If anyone is going to beat the Yankees, it’s going to be the

Dodgers in the World Series or the Astros in the American League Championship.” Dodgers lost

in the first round to the Nationals, then the Astros beat the Yankees in the next round. So, the big

Yankee fan I am, still heartbroken that Altuve hit a walk off homerun to send the Yankees home,

is now rooting for the Astros to win the World Series. I continued to double down on the Astros

which didn’t feel right as a Yankee fan and definitely didn’t feel right to my bank account as a

result.

Another unsuccessful experience as a result of the World Series was me and my dumb

friends getting into a scuffle at a local bar. It doesn’t surprise me that we got into a scuffle

because some of my friends don’t know how to keep their mouths shut, but this was at a local

bar, and my friend and this older dude were arguing over the SAME EXACT thing. They both

just weren’t sober enough to realize it, so as a result we got kicked out and had to go back to one

of my buddies’ houses to watch the rest of the game.

The World Series wasn’t terrible completely. I still had some successful experiences while

watching the World Series. The first successful experience goes hand and hand with an

unsuccessful experience. Even though I lost money on the Astros, I still love baseball and post
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season baseball is a whole different atmosphere. It was also awesome to watch a low budget

team like the Nationals defeat a powerhouse roster like the Astros. Everyone who loves sports

loves an underdog story, except if your team is the one getting upset. On top of the underdog

story, I also get to say I watched the Washington Nationals win their first World Series.

Another successful experience I had while watching the World Series came from home. My

house had a collision of generations. My grandparents were over to watch the game from Upstate

Albany, my dads’ best friends from college came, my friends were there, and my sister came

home from college to watch the game too. It was the first time seeing my sister since she went to

college for her first semester at NYU so that was exciting. My dads’ buddy used to be my little

league coach and I haven’t seen him since, so it was fun to catch up with him too. All in all, a

great experience.

Some ways that the MLB can improve awareness marketing leading up to the World Series

next year is by hospitality.

“Hospitality is a sponsorship activity that combines personal selling, positioning, and

sales promotion…Hospitality opportunities are a sponsorship asset or benefit commonly

associated with premier events such as the Olympics, World Cup, Super Bowl, NBA All-

Star Weekend, Daytona 500, and concert tours of major performing artists” (Mullin,

232).

Some of the biggest sporting events are there, MLB should be a part of that list if they want to

improve awareness. Something that the MLB might want to consider is a show of some sort.

Even though there isn’t a half time like there is during the Super Bowl, an idea of a performance

of some sort before the game or a longer 7th inning stretch may attract more awareness.
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Another step is making viewers watch it more. In order to attract more viewers for the

World Series, you need to start during the regular season. Make it more accessible. Force them to

watch it. Put baseball everywhere. The MLB showed a game a week on YouTube, games can be

streamed on MLB.com with a subscription, you can watch your local teams through your TV

provider. The next step should be to put it somewhere where everyone can get every game for

free for a limited time. In the beginning of the year, my dad and I noticed we had the “Extra

Innings Package” for free, so we could watch every game, but it only lasted a week. The MLB

should do that for a month to get more awareness. In the textbook, John Spoelestra, whose

worked with the Portland Trailblazers gave a few suggestions of the best elements and tactics

from any marketing plan. “Bring radio and television production in house. Sell at least 80

percent of all tickets before the opening game. Don’t wait for a superstar. Find other ways to sell

your team.” (Mullin, 47).

Some marketing improvements that can be made to the World Series to showcase/sell the

fan experience is to try to keep the game young. The MLB freaked out for a little when players

threw/flipped their bat after a home run. The kids love that. I always appreciated a walk-off

celebration, when I saw players flipping bats for monster home runs, I loved it!

“Overall attendance is down 6 percent across the nation, the average game features successful

offensive action — such as a base hit — only once every 10 or 11 minutes…the average age of

the MLB viewer is roughly 57, according to Barron’s” (frntofficesport.com). MLB has tried to

speed the game up, but you can’t. It’s a thinking man’s game. Everything is so analytical now.

The best thing that the MLB is doing is telling the viewers the analytics for example, the exit

velocity, how fast/hard the ball is coming off the bat.

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Another thing that the MLB can try to do to showcase the World Series better is

promoting the star players more. The NFL and NBA focus on promoting their stud players. Dak

Prescott, Baker Mayfield, Saquon Barkley, Aaron Rodgers, the list goes on and on. “Colorado

Rockies star Charlie Blackmon noted that he’d like to see the sport do more to “showcase its

players,” and take advantage of endorsement deals and sponsorship opportunities out there like

“selling Wheaties; producing online content and behind-the-scenes-stuff…””

(frntofficesport.com). Featured stars in the World Series should do commercials together to show

animosity and build some more momentum going into the game. Something the MLB did great

with was the old school new school videos with the legends of the past and the legends now, that

really combined generations.

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Works Cited

Good Morning America. (n.d.). How a decision to save $19 worth of beer made this guy a World

Series legend. Retrieved from https://www.goodmorningamerica.com/culture/story/bud-light-

commercial-airs-world-series-celebrate-guy-66633264.

Inside MLB's Marketing Debate: League Needs to Step Up Its Efforts. (2018, August 9). Retrieved

from https://frntofficesport.com/inside-mlbs-marketing-debate/.

Mann, K. (2019, October 29). Julia Rose: MLB Bans Model for Flashing at World Series. Retrieved

from https://heavy.com/news/2019/10/julia-rose/.

Mullin, B. J., Hardy, S., & Sutton, W. A. (2014). Sports Marketing. Champaign, IL: Human

Kinetics.

Zigu. (n.d.). MLB Major League Baseball Marketing Mix (4Ps) Strategy. Retrieved from

https://www.mbaskool.com/marketing-mix/services/17815-mlb-major-league-baseball.html.